Adam Nagourney of the New York Times was in attendance at CPAC yesterday. His article on the conference completely whitewashes the content of Ann Coulter’s attacks on the Democratic presidential field. Nagourney writes:
The conference drew thousands of attendees, many of whom waited in a long line out the door for a late-afternoon appearance by Ann Coulter, the conservative author and commentator. Still, the tone of the conference was less excitement about the 2008 campaign than concern about the ideological credentials of the three leading contenders for the Republican nomination.
Nagourney does not discuss the content of Coulter’s speech. He does not address the raucous applause that greeted her and followed almost every line of her speech, which resembled a stand-up comic routine for its lack of narrative and sole reliance on cheap one line jokes about Democrats. Most importantly, Nagourney does not mention that Coulter called John Edwards a faggot and the crowd loved it.
There were over fifty non-elected official speakers at CPAC yesterday. Nagourney’s article mentions seven Republican politicians and only two political commentators, conservative blogger Paloma Zepeda and Coulter. By giving Coulter such a prominent reference in his article at the expense of scores of other Republican speakers, Nagourney sets her out as the major figure at the event. There is no doubt about that. But by failing to even hint at what Coulter stands for, Nagourney allows her hateful speech that the Republican attendees of CPAC adore and approve to go unchallenged and unquestioned.
My question to Nagourney’s editors at the New York Times is this: do you believe that Coulter’s homophobic rhetoric is so acceptable that you find no need to discredit her in your paper? The New York Times has validated Coulter’s homophobia and framed it as completely acceptable political discourse, not worthy of mention or elucidation in their report on CPAC. In so doing, the Times has given Coulter license to preach her hate with impunity, knowing that it will not hurt coverage of her in the mainstream press. Not only did they validate her in this way, but they allowed Nagourney to highlight her appearance as the most newsworthy of all other political speeches by non-politicians at CPAC. While Coulter certainly made news yesterday, it wasn’t for merely showing up as Nagourney suggests.
Technorati Tags: Adam Nagourney, Ann Coulter, Conservative Political Action Conference, CPAC, CPAC 2007
1 Response to “CPAC: Nagourney Whitewashes Coulter’s Speech”
Something to say?
AdNags shills for Republicans during an election year. I’m not surprised.
Left by Matt Ortega
March 3, 2007 at 1:35pm